As computer chip speeds on circuit boards increase to ever faster speeds, communication bottlenecks in inter-chip communication are becoming a more significant problem. One possible solution to try to avoid bottlenecks is to use fiber optics to interconnect high speed computer chips. However, most circuit boards involve many layers and often require tolerances in their manufacture of less than a micron. Physically placing fiber optics and connecting the fibers to the chips can be too inaccurate and time consuming to be widely adopted in circuit board manufacturing processes.
Routing the optical signals around and between circuit boards can add significant additional complexity. Marketable optical interconnects between chips have therefore proven illusive, despite the need for broadband data transfer.